The Origin, Development, and Present of Garden (Landscape) Architecture

Motto:
A garden or park in esoteric thinking represents the ideal vision of a regular, square-oriented cosmic residence, situated within the domain of heavenly eternity. The water mirrors of reservoirs and pools reflect the sky; the water gushing from fountains is a picture of the four paradisiacal rivers. Apparent disorder is an expression of a higher order. For we call chaos only what we have not yet understood……
Moreover, the work of nature is the work of hidden intelligences, a dispersed higher consciousness, so all of its manifestations are resonances of living being, and the human artist should create in harmony with the creative forces of natural existence, not against them…
The work of the gardener involves organizing the elements of nature in real space, in sets that are mutually related.

Origin
Garden – better said landscape architecture (note, do not confuse with the term landscape creation, which includes only the technical and technological field, engineering activity!) as the art of composing gardens, parks, and landscapes is a visual activity, the results of which are manifestations of shaping living and non-living elements of nature in unity with many other artistic disciplines (sculpture, painting, musical and literary composition, scenography, and more). It creates works that are always alive, growing, and changing in space and time. It is a very broad issue; therefore, the term landscape architecture is more suitable to relate only to a part of the creative processes – garden design. It is part of the professions of architectural creation, which creates values that influence thinking, mental state and ethics of human personality, and its emotional experiences.
Creative principles of landscape architecture stem from its development, aided by philosophical views, experiences, and works from other areas of art.
One could say that the first landscape work of man was the path. The trodden way through the forest, steppe, countryside. Initially, it was a connection to the most vital places - to the source of sustenance (primarily water) and shelter. All surrounded by "wild" nature. Thus arises a fundamental relationship, the relationship between "sustenance" (spring) and "dwelling" (cave). Later, the point of sacredness is added. A place where man worships unknown forces. He asks for a good and happy hunt. In the landscape, this is usually a clearing, mountain, tree, rock. (From here comes the vertical axis connecting heaven and earth, materialized into pyramids, ziggurats, towers, trees). Thus, a triangle arises - sustenance - dwelling - deity. The whole is again surrounded by free nature.
The architectural nature of this first path between the spring, cave, and sacred hill is given by usage, becoming a part of life. Man no longer wanders the countryside. The path thus becomes an expression of the need for life, is incorporated into its order. The cave connected to it ceases to be merely a formation of nature, becoming his home, securing man, and man secures it - the home. And he begins to organize his surroundings according to his needs. A fenced space arises - an enclosure-garden. He modifies his surroundings, increasingly pushing away the original nature until he transforms it "to his image". New landscapes emerge: the landscape of dwelling, the landscape of sustenance, the landscape of ideas. Thus, man entered nature. Man walked his first path. He submits to the flow of events, often awaiting them in fear. He is humble. His path was sensitive and merciful. It did not destroy, merely made accessible.
Subsequently, man began to learn rapidly. Accessibility was not enough. He needed more and cheaper: for a great price that someone else had to pay. Gradually, he begins to realize this and matures to the point of consciously creating works for his pleasure and satisfaction, often for the expression of his wealth and power. Yet he always secretly seeks the paradisiacal landscape, paradise, primordial happiness. He creates gardens. For a garden is a defined entity in space and time, not only physically but primarily with its soul. It transforms flora, terrain, water, climate, atmosphere, without respecting the soul of the place - genius loci, with the aim of achieving the desired experience. Unlike a park - which arises later - where emphasizing the genius of the place is its creative principle. It can include - and often includes - gardens. Likewise, gardens can be part of the landscape.
From the original path, from protecting shelters and modifying their surroundings, to intentional garden, park, and landscape compositions, landscape architecture has gone through a long development - stylistic periods. Essentially, two types of landscape works have crystallized. Regular (formal), composed of regularly shaped designs, organized according to main compositional axes, derived as it were from the fundamental quadrature of the paradisiacal garden of Eden, segmented by four biblical rivers - the Euphrates, Tigris, Pishon, and Chiton. The second group consists of irregular (landscape) compositions with a highly variable plan, with hidden allusions that evoke emotions. Their images are presented to users in often elaborately formulated sequences. They appear natural, even though the participant is deliberately guided by them.
In a historical excursion, we could mention many gardens:

Development
The Egyptian garden is regular, divided by avenues, and closely connected to the house. Arbors and shady pergolas are common, with a pool full of aquatic plants, especially lotuses, fish, and waterfowl. It is surrounded by a high wall, with fountains in the courtyards. The whole is complemented by ornamental and utility plants grown in containers, regularly spaced along the walls.
Hittite - Babylonian and Syrian gardens are also formal. Here was the legendary garden of Eden, whose fame was surpassed only by the Hanging Gardens of Semiramis, built around 600 BC by King Nebuchadnezzar. The garden terraces were artificially irrigated with a thick layer of soil on a substrate insulated with natural asphalt. Plants were imported from occupied territories to these areas. Somewhat like the first collection - botanical gardens and arboreta were established. Unlike Egypt, they were built on hills that were suitably modified. Diodorus Siculus (1st century BC) and Strabo (64 BC - 19 AD) mention their technical equipment.
From these gardens, the Persian gardens emerge. Here we find the term pairadeasa, which in the Bible denotes the lost paradise. These are regular gardens, often in connection with a free, landscape part, areas, or sacred groves. In ancient India, gardens were an obvious part of life not only for the highest ruling classes (in one of these, Gauthama Buddha was born), but public orchards were also established, often with extensive pools for purification and cult rituals. Social life took place in the gardens, where numerous small architectural structures – pavilions, shelters, covered arbours with fountains – were located. Ornamental and utility plants, fragrant and medicinal herbs were cultivated there. Particularly rich were (and still are - e.g., the Taj Mahal in Agra) gardens around mausoleums and sacred precincts. They were built on flat land, often also on terraced terrain, utilizing numerous water features. These flourished particularly in modeled landscapes of cult and social precincts and settlements of the legendary Angkor. All of these were architectural modifications, regular, rectangular divisions.
A special place in the development of garden art is held by Chinese, Korean peninsula, and later Japanese island gardens. These are loosely, landscape-composed wholes, imbued with hidden symbolism, derived from Chinese painting. They seek inspiration in real landscapes and their elements. To worship nature and live in perfect harmony with it were teachings of Confucius, Lao-tse, and Buddha. Evidence of the first gardens here comes from the years 207 BC - 200 AD from the Han dynasty. Around the year 1000 AD, Chinese garden art reached its highest perfection. Gardens were either small, even miniature, but also huge (the imperial ones), yet always offering intimacy. Here, nanisms (miniatures of plants, mainly woody species) began to be cultivated. Their use then transitioned into smaller forms of Korean gardens and into Japan, where they reached their greatest expansion and significance.
If we remain on the European continent, we must recall gardens in ancient Greece. They were both public and private. Socrates took walks and philosophized with his academicians in the shady groves under the Acropolis (where Athena’s olive tree still grows), where tree-lined avenues grew in the cities. Gardens of Mycenaean culture were the model, as well as perhaps Persian or Indian ones, about which surely information was obtained through exploratory and conquering campaigns. Homer mentions gardens, divided into several parts. Demosthenes (384 - 322 BC) talks about a rose garden. The repeated Adonis festivals were also significant, worshiping his garden cult. They were regular with numerous native and exotic plants. Gardens also appear in legends and myths, such as the gardens of the Hesperides with golden apples (perhaps citrus). Greenhouses existed in gardens already in the 5th century BC. Ancient Greek naturalists also mention them, such as Theophrastus (373 - 288 BC), in his nine-volume *Historia Plantarum*, describing around 500 species of cultivated plants, or later Dioscorides.
Formal gardens also include the gardens of imperial Rome. They follow the garden culture of Greece, which they develop. Here, the garden becomes an integral part of homes, villas, simple houses, and social or cultural buildings. Important are the patios, with covered porticos, atria with impluvia as the focal point of houses, with rich artistic decoration, as evidenced by discovered artifacts from Pompeii, Herculaneum, and Stabiae, "preserved" in volcanic ash after the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD. Significant were the gardens at "recreational" villas on the outskirts, in the free countryside, which were owned by figures like Pliny or Cicero. The Roman hills, above inhospitable marshy lowlands, provided ideal locations for building gardens. Particularly notable were the gardens of the Roman consul Lucullus on Monte Pincio, designed according to Eastern models, Sallust's gardens, Empress Livia's gardens on the Palatine, and those of Maecenas. An important work was the complex of gardens, cultural and social facilities of Emperor Hadrian in modern-day Tivoli, which can still serve as a model for constructing educational and recreational gardens and parks (the ancient precursor of today's Parisian parks such as La Villette or Citroën Park). Gardens, usually surrounded by high walls, also included "wild" parts, free nature or landscape, often supplemented by wildlife.
Roman gardens continued into Byzantine gardens, which were part not only of imperial palaces in antiquity Byzantion (present-day Istanbul) but also of other public buildings and private estates.
In this context, Islamic gardens are also defined, stemming from the belief that heaven-paradise is a garden. They are very close to Moorish gardens, in which the dominant and irreplaceable element is water; in various forms, as a calm mirror, gurgling streams, channels originating in fountains, "water avenues" gushing forth or bubbling springs. They are an integral part of the architecture of buildings, supporting their function and philosophy. They have survived, for example, in the Spanish Alhambra. They are inspired by Persian gardens with pavilions, aviaries, gloriettes, and pergolas, scented with the flowers of roses and other plants, cultivated in beds as well as in pots.
The Middle Ages, characterized by building castles in hard-to-reach places with confined spaces, marks a certain decline in garden art. It is limited to small "castle gardens" enclosed by fencing and intended primarily for growing medicinal and fragrant plants. They serve as quiet and resting places, with a well and a seating area on a modified terrain - a grassy bench.
The development of garden works is subsequently tied to the building of monasteries. Typical are "paradise gardens", cross-sectioned into quadrants of flower beds, derived from the convergence of four biblical rivers. In the middle is usually a well or at least a water reservoir – also for the purpose of irrigating plants, originally primarily medicinal and utility. It was surrounded by a cloister.
With the advent of new philosophical views for a true understanding of the world and life - the Renaissance turning to the legacy of antiquity, artistic works - gardens - also emerge. They are characterized by regularity, axiality, a clear binding to the structure - villa. Using paths, they typically delineate square fields of flat garden parterres, often interspersed with low trimmed edges around flower beds, frequently supplemented with plants - primarily lemon and orange trees in terracotta pots. The center of the composition is formed by a fountain with a sculpture. The garden is enclosed by a wall, emphasizing the contrast and distinction of an artificially and strictly regulated space and its order from the "wild" surroundings. Views from the garden, especially when situated in varied terrain, highlight this phenomenon. They are built in residential complexes, but (and increasingly) in their surrounding landscapes. The terrain is often terraced with the help of prominent architectural features - staircases, balustrades, ramps, and water surfaces. Their parts often include loosely composed groves, as we see in the oldest gardens of antiquity. Their cradle is Italy. The famous Villa Madama in Rome, the first Roman "suburban villa," on the slope of the Monte Mario, or the Villa Medici, overlooking the panorama of the city, both of which are still preserved. The Orti Farnesiani, the summer papal residence near the Forum Romanum, were significant. Roman Renaissance gardens and villas connect to the tradition of ancient gardens of Lucullus, Sallust, and others. Significant works from this artistic period exist in Tuscany, especially in Florence and its surroundings (Giardino di Boboli, Villa Castello, Villa Petraia, Medici, and others). Impressive are the gardens of Villa Lante at Bagnaia or Caprarola near Viterbo. In our country, for example, at Bučovice or at the summer residence Kratochvíle.
The foundations of Renaissance gardens further evolve into the form of mannerist gardens, whose outstanding manifestation is the garden at the Villa d'Este in Italian Tivoli, and in our country the Kroměříž Libosad - Květná garden, or the Wallenstein garden in Prague. They represent the pinnacle of this artistic garden style and herald its further development in the baroque period.
The baroque garden is characterized by regularity, which is enriched by complex decorative ornaments on the garden parterre, composed of perforated curves (broderie-lace), created by shaped trees, low and high green walls. The terrain is artificially shaped, and its integral parts are water surfaces, small architectural structures, and rich sculptural decoration with thoughtful symbolism. They unfold from the palace building and the existing landscape is intentionally and radically modified. The most significant works were created in France, whose creator is André Le Nôtre (1613-1700), who laid his artistic principles in the gardens of the château Vaux le Vicomte. His masterpiece was created in Versailles for Louis XIV. These complexes served as models for contemporary garden art throughout Europe. In our country, for example, at the chateau in Jaroměřice nad Rokytnou, in Milotice, Dobříš, or Buchlovice, where the influences of Italian baroque gardens are evident, as well as in the Vrtbovská garden in Prague or the gardens under Prague Castle. The baroque garden emphasizes the grandeur of scale at the expense of detail, and the compositional aim tends towards point de vue as a culmination of the garden. From here, the connection to the surrounding landscape often continues.
After the fatigue of the monumentality and complexity of the baroque, artistic and philosophical efforts tend towards simplification, again returning to the rationality of classical antiquity. Classicism and classical gardens emerge. This simplification also signifies a search for elements of free nature. Gardens are supplemented with romantic objects – ruins, exotic architectures; thus gradually, a romantic garden forms, a park that utilizes elements from the surrounding nature, complemented by ancient symbolism, pavilions, temples, sculptures.
These efforts lead to a complete departure from formal gardens, whose elements were deemed unnatural. A landscape garden, park forms. It is often still tied to remnants of formal, baroque gardens, which it subsequently transforms entirely in conception, terrain, and philosophy. It arises in England, based on the ideas and creations of William Kent. The basis of his works was the curve of a stream, around which scenic backdrops of vegetation, imitations of ancient buildings, dramatic and calm water features, sculptures, and symbols of mythology were arranged. The surviving park at Rousham near Oxford is notable. This was followed by the work of Lancelot Brown in the mid-18th century, who stripped parks of ancient symbolism and sought to approach the given landscape. Later, these types of gardens are deemed poor and are again supplemented with exotic buildings, a task undertaken in the late 18th century by William Chambers. Exotic plants are utilized, and formal adjustments of parts of the park are revisited. Later, towards the end of the 18th century, H. Repton critiques this creation and returns to the true elements of nature, only for J. C. Loudon to reintroduce formal adjustments to the English landscape garden.
This evolution significantly influenced the development of garden art throughout Europe. From this period, when grand transformations of landscapes also emerged, we have many notable works in our country. The most significant among them is the modification of the Lednice park and the entire Lednice-Valtice area, or the landscape park in Průhonice, inspired by the Czech landscape. Regular modifications of gardens were dismantled and reestablished until reaching a certain opinionated and artistic decline of creation. With certain exceptions, this state endures to this day.
Contemporary creation is marked on one side by the construction of extensive, educational-recreational complexes, connecting to the emergence of urban parks during the 19th century in connection with the dissolution of city walls, following the example of major world cities (New York, London, Paris). A new settlement structure is developing, of which private gardens and public spaces are a part. Systems of greenery within settlements are created, interwoven with circular and radiating strips of greenery that connect settlements with surrounding landscapes. This should be the ideal result of today’s efforts.
In many cases, however, the city increasingly overshadows nature without hope for its rescue. The resulting construction attacks the landscape. In places where man walked and lived, the man "primitive," but in harmony with the flow of nature and its laws. Today, the "wise" man has erected his housing machines here. They are far from all “roots,” thus he must quickly transport them to other places. As if he has forgotten that the urban fringe provides a unique opportunity where settlement and landscape might overlap in beautiful hope and cooperation. Where the boundaries between city and nature might blur, where the remaining landscape could be free. Where the flow of history, the history of nature, could be grasped and valued, studied. From where the "genius loci" could breathe.

For:
"In the border zone between landscape and city lies the hope that will change the form of urban life and urban forms. Traditional planning methods are not applicable here. In hindsight, looking at the city through the eyes of the landscape we see new projects that contain untried programs and new types of urban spaces." Steven Holl
It must be recognized that "Architecture is in what the quality of life is, it is about the immeasurable things. Its quality depends on the quality of decision-making." Norman Foster

Returning to specific solutions, we could, for example:

• create spaces with recreational and social functions in direct connection with the residential building
• imprint a nature-friendly character on the central park (evocation of the earlier character of the given area)
• create spaces of meticulously arranged natural elements ("raspberry clearing," "butterfly meadow," "rose garden," "sunny glades," "heath," "larch grove," "spring by the beech," "botanical garden") with educational trails, etc.
• modify streams, wetlands, ponds, lakes
• create a buffer zone between the settlement, cultivated landscape, and natural landscape (natural creations, reserves, protected areas)
• protect, complement, and regulatively make accessible the area under protection

There is not much, but many failures in this direction have already become reality. Let us focus more on creating spaces than objects. Naturally, we cannot avoid compromises on both sides. Agreement is possible, however. It is necessary not to squander the opportunity and to correctly grasp and evaluate the task. For the benefit of nature and thus of man.

Address to the creators (a garden for someone)
Yes, a garden should be for someone. Indeed, it must be! For those who need it. For life, existence, philosophy, for one's own tomatoes, lilies, or peaches. Not because their neighbor has it, not because they saw something similar in Australia or because such a garden is fashionable. Of course, this is also possible, for collecting coins. They are not creators; rather, they are "creators" who make gardens like this! (Stones from Váh by the vineyard in Mikulov, bamboo next to thyme, pergola under a tree, a waterfall perhaps from a chimney!).
I kindly ask you, do not create according to television programs. Rather, immerse yourself in the personality of the user, portray them and settle them into the landscape. Into the city, village, hills, and plains, marshes, or ponds. Draw creative thoughts from these sources, transform them into reality. Create such a garden that is good for you and the owner. And you must also respect other creators of the space of human existence. The house, castle, earth hut, or fantasy. But carefully! "From here to there," as my grandmother used to say. (She baked good bread and had a nice garden. In it, everything she needed, what she liked, what for the grave, and what for the church, at weddings, and for the coffin).
In short:
Everything there, where it belongs
so that it is good to live, eat, and love,
so that there is a mystery to discover and a bit of folly
and that other living things could live with us in it.
This we should always respect. There is already enough stone everywhere it is possible and impossible; there are enough artificial shapes without connections. Let us stop with the little waterfalls and "biotopes," with puritan "I won’t spoil anything," Japanese bridges, Chinese trinkets, and fluffy branches. We are at home, after all, in Moravia, Bohemia, Haná, Slovácko, and the Beskids; in a still harmonious landscape without wind turbines and helicopter pads. This does not mean we should not be bold. However, let us see courage in clearly distinguishing old from new, being from what is to come. But always with awareness of connections!

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Prof. Ing. Ivar Otruba, CSc. (1933), emeritus professor of garden and landscape architecture, member of the ČKA and OA ČR, recipient of the City of Brno Award for architecture and urbanism 1999, and the Lenné Prize (1969, Germany), among other awards in architectural creation and garden exhibitions. A creator in the field of restoration of garden art monuments, urban greenery and parks, landscape modification and water elements, spa complexes, and cemeteries. A significant part of his work includes garden exhibitions in our country and abroad (Austria, Germany, Slovakia). His book publications include (*Flowers in the Apartment*, *Rock Gardens and Alpine Plants*, *Garden Architecture - Creation of Gardens and Parks*, *Garden Architecture - Textbook for Secondary and Higher Education*, *The Beauty of Italian Gardens*, *The Beauty of English Gardens*, *101 of Our Most Beautiful Gardens and Parks*).